Found
by MissMazzie
Summary: This is from the Show Me Series with three separate endings written by Pamala, MissMazzie and SnowWhite22. This is chapter 2: Michael comes to Sara's bedside after the escape. (Now that the other site is back up, I was able to recover and re-post what was once lost. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like I can link individual chapters.)


Note: This is part of the **Show Me** series with three different endings written by three authors: **Pamala** , **MissMazzie** and **SnowWhite22** , all originally written back in 2006. Chapters are:

Chapter 1: **Show Me** ( **Pamala** )

Chapter 2: **Found** ( **MissMazzie** )

Chapter 3: **Walk Away** ( **Pamala** )

Conclusion A: **Impossible** ( **Pamala** )

Conclusion B: **Lost** ( **MissMazzie** )

Conclusion C: **Cold** ( **SnowWhite22** \- no longer archived)

 **Found**

She looks at me with those eyes tinged with more than just a little sadness, pleading for me to respond to her, pleading for an acknowledgement. But I'm helpless to speak, to move.

She has forfeited a confession, and the guilt, the salvation with impunity stings like a thousand penetrating cuts to my skin. She's offering me absolution.

And I know in that moment I love her.

My heart breaks a little because in the back of my mind, in the depths of my heart, I know something she doesn't yet know—it's only a momentary redemption. It won't last. It can't last. Penance will be sought. Atonement will be required.

Her hands are desperately seeking my skin beneath my shirt, pulling at the cloth, trying to loosen it from the waist of my pants. I'm riding high on instincts, but I need time to think. My fingers entwine with hers, our palms flat together as I try to slow the heated advance. I alternately push one of her hands away – push her away – then the other, only to bring her back to me again in regret, in loss.

With the growing need that engulfs my body at seeing her like this—beautiful, suppliant, wanting—my chest rises and falls deeply, my heartbeat a heavy gallop steady in my ears. My eyes flutter from each of hers down to her lips and back. It is sweet agony to be this close, but it will be torturous to lose her again.

 _Wait for me._

The words flutter in my mind. At the time, it was a demand cleverly disguised as a request. It was ludicrous to ask that of her, to exact that from her. My eyes roll back against my heavy lids and I sigh in frustration. I know my logic is losing to other, more basic, instincts.

I must stop this before it begins.

"Sara…" I lick my lips and swallow, preparing my mouth to say the words, to offer excuses, damn myself with evidence contrary to her absolution, to lie to her, lie to myself. _I didn't come here for this._ But the words become trapped.

My eyes follow her hand as she pulls mine to her cheek, forcing me to caress her soft skin. Her fingers curl around mine and she draws my hand to her lips, kissing gently. Paralyzed by both desperate relief and utter fear that coming here—coming to her—is my sweetest, most costly mistake, I am helpless to stop her.

"No words, Michael… I've waited for you. Show me everything you wanted to say... Show me."

She stops my silent objections with a kiss that I don't ignore, can't ignore, don't try to stop. Her lips are warm and moist against my own, her tongue like sanded sugar. I close my eyes trying desperately to hold onto her succulence, the smooth friction of her lips against mine. It's over too soon and her lips have gotten away. I am both warmed by her closeness and chilled by her absence. And she takes in another deep breath as she pulls my lips back with hers, sucking slightly, trying to hold me close. I don't want her to let me get away even though my mind spins her words as my own.

 _I realize_ you _can't stay._

I know it is the better part of valor to stop it before it gets started, but my body defers to my heart that has forced my logic into submission. And it occurs to me in a passing thought I easily choose to ignore that she won't remember this. She can't miss something she never had, she can't miss somebody she never knew, that after this… she won't remember. She'll be whole, pure, untouched by my latest sin. She'll never know that I am left to bear the burden, the punishment, alone. I will miss her forever. And she will simply never know.

It is on a dangerous precipice I balance between heaven and hell. There will be suffering whichever way I fall.

I will lose her either way.

I raise myself above her and force her head back with my hands. I am now too desperate, selfish, greedy, to let her go for even a moment as she helps me strip. With one knee on the bed, I lift her into me, pulling her backward with me. I collapse on top of her, our lips crashing, bruising. My body binds her, willingly, beneath me.

She clutches me to her like she's afraid to let go, like she is saving me from my own logic that she somehow knows is screaming at me to withdraw from her while I still can… as if I could. It is at complete odds with the reckless course we're on. But she's a doctor—it's instinctual to save people.

I don't need saving.

"Michael…Michael…" She says my name with a longing that reflects my own. It's a sigh and a moan tangled into one and it fans the deep, primal yearning that is driving me toward her. "I just want… I just need…"

I silence her with a heavy kiss, my open mouth against hers, my tongue pressing. There will be time for words later. When this moment, this need, this dream fades, a confession must still be tendered.

Her hands slide over my body, gripping me with a frantic intensity, and I suspect there will be red marks that will unevenly color the black designs on my back. She is hot against my skin. Her chest pushes up and against mine, and her arms clutch at me, pull me back into her. It's like she can't get close enough. She isn't close enough.

It isn't slow or romantic.

I sink inside her. _Oh, God._ It is both an expletive and a prayer as I realize the intensity of my emotions must mean that this is my dying wish come true and that I am destined to pay an eternity in hell for this moment. It is a strange dichotomy to be at once both lost and found.

With every muscle taut, I notice the trembling in my limbs, the humming frequency in my body converging on a high pitch that threatens to shatter me. The delicious ache becoming unbearable with every stroke, releasing only momentarily with needful, wanting moans from the depths of my chest, only to rebuild exponentially and consumingly.

I hear it again. "Michael… Michael…" But it's different somehow and I can't place it. Suddenly, though she is in my arms, I feel like she is farther away, like I'm being ripped away. I grasp her hands, pinning her arms to the mattress, trying desperately to anchor myself to her.

"Michael… Michael…" Though I see her lips mouthing my name, the tone is deep, urgent, and not at all hers. But the distance now is too close and she is almost lost in the tunnel of darkness that is ravaging my vision.

A jolt to my body startles me and my eyes flutter open. "Michael, you're having that dream again. Wake up!" my brother snaps as he kicks the leg of the couch.

The stark morning light streaming in through the window kills my dream. Reality is a dingy, cramped, seedy motel room. We are still on the run. And I am lost. Tenting my hand over the bridge of my nose, I push my fingertips in to my closed eyes hoping to recapture her before she fades away.

I'm too late.

I roll over using my elbow to right myself on the edge of the musty, worn couch that is entirely too small. I correct Lincoln with a voice hoarse with the illusion that had engulfed me. "No. It wasn't 'that' dream." I grab the blanket and pull it into my lap, bunching it so as to hide the physical evidence as to what the dream really was. "This one was altogether different."

"I can see that." He folds closed the paper he's scanning for any news, any sightings reported on himself or me. He knows all too well where this conversation is heading.

I put my feet on the floor, spread wide, bracing myself against this uncomfortable tilt my world has taken. My elbows press into my knees as my hands scrub the frustration from my face. Weakened, my arms fall, my hands hang helplessly between my knees, my head hangs low. "Linc…"

"Don't start, Michael," he warns.

"Linc…"

The newspaper hits the table with a high-pitched _whap_ interrupting my attempt to offer reasons, excuses he's all too ready to dismiss. "Michael…" He sits forward in his chair, obviously annoyed, and he will refuse to let me get a word in edgewise. "We've been through this a thousand goddamn times. You can't."

"I can," I say, as I raise my unwavering eyes to his. He doesn't know what he's asking of me, the sacrifice he demands. "I have to."

To be continued...


End file.
